24 January 2010

Steady run Saturday

I was feeling the effects of a tough end of the week training. Boxercise with lots of push ups and leg draining exercises on Wednesday, a punishingly brilliant PT session with weighted intervals and a swim on Thursday night.

Saturday’s often a rest day. A day when I get my chores done – shopping, washing, the usual stuff. But the forecast was for rain all day Sunday, so I did my chores thinking all the time about getting out for a run mid-afternoon.

I set off with two goals – to run for an hour and to test out my new contact lenses. An hour’s not much more than I ran on my long run last weekend, but psychologically the time, rather than the distance goal made me pace more steadily.

I started off and my hands were cold, so I pulled down my sleeves to cover them. I was pleased I’d opted to go back and add a short sleeve top over my long sleeve one. But I knew I didn’t need gloves and my hands warmed up before I was really aware of it.

I settled quickly, running steady, steady, keeping the breathing easy and even. I stretched out the pace and pushed off the back foot, keeping it smooth and easy. I took a couple of inclines, little steps, little steps and leant forward slightly into the wind.

It felt smoother this week. Easier because I wasn’t wrestling with my thoughts so much. My legs were still carrying the remnants of the week’s training, so I eased them out gently, warming through the muscles, stretching out and keeping it steady, steady.

I passed the usual markers and turned for home after 30 minutes. The half way point was not so troublesome this time. The wind dropped and I took advantage of a long flat straight to push on.

I barely glimpsed at the Garmin – back to running the time, never mind the distance. But when I did catch a glimpse the pace looked good, and the breathing felt easy.

I began to feel my calves and hamstrings tighten in the last couple of kilometres, but it wasn’t far to go and by focusing on rolling through my feet and trying to lessen the impact, I pushed on.

I finished within sight of home, stetched out my tight muscles, feeling a weirdly satisfying pull across my abs and jogged back.

So what did I learn on this run?

Steady, steady is good. My kilometre splits have been pretty consistent on my last two runs. I seem to find my pace and stay there. And I’m getting faster.

Relaxed in my head means relaxed in my breathing and overall running.

I don’t need my iPod for this kind of run any more. I’ve raced without it and now I can train without it. The music was great for distracting me and encouraging me, but I’ve got it within myself to do that now.

The contact lenses are great – no noticeable difference from when I’m running with my glasses, but maybe more of a sense of freedom.

I surprised myself by knocking a minute off last week’s 10k time – 53.54.